Jerks Are Worse Than Cleanup Threads

@War Jay 77: I get the Cullen example. But Designated Hero, Unintentionally Unsympathetic, Unfortunate Implications and Realism-Induced Horror cover that such he's be just as unlikeable even if the hater didn't compare him to the villain. As a sub-trope to RIH, JAWTV should only be used if more fitting than RIH which I don't see this case with Cullen as comparisons with the villain seem less the problem than his behavior on it own.

Though with Cullen he's achieved such a critical mass of hate any additional analysis or new reasons to hate him seem nit-picky.

And I agree Hate Sink should only be used when there isn't an antagonist to properly root against otherwise, but it's currently being used for any stand out vile character but that may be another issue for another cleanup.

Edited by Ferot_Dreadnaught on Jun 8th 2021 at 1:44:16 AM

But this trope isn't about comparison with the villains, it's about the scale of fan hate, and that's all it's ever been. Edward would count because fans hate him more than they hate, idk, the Volturi. That's the contrast- he's hated for being a jerk, and fans hate him more than they hate the villains, and that's this trope.

It's not nitpicky to point this out- it's just objectively true. It's how people reacted, and that's all Audience Reaction tropes are about at their core. Not about the specific context of the work or the justification for the reaction. Audience Reactions shouldn't be about justifying the reaction or proving the fans correct, it should just be about explaining the reaction that exists and why fans feel how they feel.

Breaking this trope down to the core, it's just "There's a realistic jerk and a less-realistic villain, and the jerk is hated more".

Edited by WarJay77 on Jun 8th 2021 at 4:52:02 AM

I thought this cleanup or somewhere else said yes it had to compare them to villains, but I could be wrong.

The trope description states "One common, and perhaps baffling, reaction to fiction is that audiences tend to react with greater disdain, hatred or even outright revulsion to garden-variety Jerkass characters than they do to the actual villains of the story, even if the villain's deeds are far more heinous in nature. While this makes virtually zero sense from a rational perspective—unsurprisingly, as cold facts often have little to do with how a person feels—there are some rational explanations for this phenomenon." This makes it sound like the hate has to be irrational from a narrative perspective.

If it's not about why the hate is seemingly irrational and/or compared with the villains hate, I don't see how it has enough substance or analysis to keep it from being untropeworthey complaining.

And why is Cullen, who I agree would fit the current definition despite my misgivings over it, not already listed?

Cullen's not listed just because nobody bothered to list him yet. This trope is still pretty new.

In any case, yeah, this reaction is irrational. It's irrational to hate a rude coworker more than a universe-destroying emperor. Objectively, the emperor is worse. The psychology behind it doesn't mean the reaction isn't still at odds with what most people would expect. The creator wouldn't expect people to hate the minor petty jerk more than they hate the Big Bad. You'd expect it to be the opposite, because the Big Bad is an objectively worse person. That's what that paragraph means. This reaction is never going to be rational because if you think about it purely from a logical standpoint, no, it doesn't make sense to hate the unintentionally jerkass love-interest more than the villains who want to murder the protagonist. The fact that fans have this reaction is irrational because typically you're expected to hate people based on their actual actions and motivations, not just their personalities.

But it's not irrational in the way you're thinking of. There doesn't need to be some in-narrative contrast or comparison, there just needs to be two characters and an audience to react to them. That's why this reaction can occur even between two villains- because if one of those villains is objectively less evil but far more of a dick, fans will hate that villain for being a dick, even if they're not the most evil villain in the story. Granted, the comparison still needs to make sense- they have to be from the same story and exist at the same time (narratively speaking; this doesn't mean that a time-travel story or a story with a weird timeline wouldn't count for this). You can't just shoehorn two random characters from two different works in the franchise.

In general, I guess I'm just not seeing where your confusion lies. To me, it's all very cut and dry, and all very simple. I'm tired though so maybe I'm not explaining things well, or maybe I'm having trouble understanding your points well enough.

Edited by WarJay77 on Jun 8th 2021 at 5:28:54 AM

Apologies. Let me try to clarify.

I get now that this is about hate that's irrational from the standpoint of the narrative, but justifiable from audience perspective. And I figured out the distinction with Realism-Induced Horror; RIH is about fear, JAWTV is about disgust.

I think what's throwing me off is the "Villains" part making up so much of the title is making the comparison seem more critical than it actually is.

The Scrappy, which also involves irrational (contrary) from the narrative but justified to audiences hate, has a bunch of rules over what kind of hate does/doesn't count to keep it analytical (why they're unintentionally disliked) and from being complaining about characters you don't like. JAWTV seems so similar I feel it need similar rules, or don't get why it doesn't.

And how/when does JAWTV cross over to Misaimed Hatedom? It seems connected and knowing the line between them might help.

Thanks for helping me get my head wrapped around this.

Well, yeah, the idea here is that because of the realistic nature of jerks, fans will hate them more than they hate the characters in the story they actually "should" hate- those being the villains. The phenomenon isn't just in the hatred of these jerks but in the fact that they're hated more than the actually evil characters in the story, because the more evil characters aren't realistic enough to strike a chord.

If it was just "Jerks Are Hated", that'd be The Scrappy and not worth mentioning. The contrast in opinions is the interesting part- that's the phenomenon we're troping. And the villains part is necessary too, because it brings up the point that most villains aren't realistic enough to be hated, or have enough charisma to become well-liked characters, whereas the jerks are just unpleasant by comparison.

The concepts are similar, but not so similar that they need the exact same rules, as this is about the unexpected way fans react to different types of characters and less so about the character they hate. The villain is the other side of the coin- they need to be discussed as well, and that's what keeps it from just being The Scrappy But More. Good examples should explain why the jerk is hated, and why the villain isn't.

As for Misaimed Fandom, I'm not sure. Probably need someone else to discuss it.

Edited by WarJay77 on Jun 8th 2021 at 1:28:57 PM

The Star-Lord example got brought up again on ATT, and I'm in favor of cutting it. He's not portrayed as a jerk in general, and his mistake on Titan is because he can't think straight and loses his better judgment, not about deliberately antagonizing anyone. It's also far from true that Thanos wasn't hated, as the brutality of his actions makes him easy to root against despite his tragic backsory.

Yeah, that's a cut.

Just "Jerks Are Hated" isn't The Scrappy as Scrappy is about unintentionally hated characters, and jerks generally intentionally hated. (JAWTV does explain why Scrappies are disproportionally jerk despite it supposedly being a strike against it being unintentional.)

I agree getting more "good" examples will help fix misuse. But I think we need some clear criteria for a good example. This cleanup suggests many others are unclear as to what a good example is.

If Hate Sink is meant to be when JAWTV is intentionally used by the narrative, isn't it a sub-trope of JAWTV and thus JAWTV shouldn't be used if the more specific sub trope applies?

For Misaimed Fandom/Hatedom, I think the threshold is that JAWTV is casing them to objectively ignore facts about the narrative to support such beliefs.

Realized something about the Cullen example. Jerkass and most related tropes are not YMMV, that's why I think it should be limited to intentional jerks otherwise it's a better fit for other complaints like Designated Hero even if it's related. Sound like an argument for limiting to intentional jerks (or was that due to it not being a matter of jerkassery?).

Edited by Ferot_Dreadnaught on Jun 8th 2021 at 3:00:09 AM

Starlord wasn't a Jerk. He's UU, but not a Jerk.

By the way, I think the crowner is well past due to be called.

UU cleanup determined he's not UU as he's meant to be in the the wrong for that mistake and realized such. UU requires it be for objectively different reason than intended, not just less than intended. (Maybe the difference between JAWTS and UU is the former is based on subjectives feelings and the latter is based on feeling the objective facts don't add up to the intended sympathy.)

Again, as JAWTS is effectively the super trope to Hate Sink, is there any reason to use JAWTV if the sub-trope applies?

Well, since one is YMMV and one's objective, it can't be the supertrope. Hell, I even said before that JAWTV has nothing to do with Hate Sink, since Hate Sink characters usually don't have a villain to contrast. You don't usually need a Hate Sink if the audience has someone to oppose. No Villain =/= Not This Trope. That's something I feel like I need to hammer in here, because it's a key detail you seem to be missing.

Again, it's not just "jerk is hated", it's "the jerk is hated, and the villain isn't".

I'm honestly still having a hard time seeing where your confusion lies with this trope. I think you're getting too hung up on minor details that don't actually affect the trope at all.

...And yes, we need to call this damn crowner.

Edited by WarJay77 on Jun 8th 2021 at 11:18:11 AM

So the trope boils down to "the jerk is hated worse than the villain, even if it makes no narrative sense"? I can work with that.

I thought you said that they didn't need to be compared to the villains, or were you talking about antagonists?

What I meant is that the work doesn't compare them. There's no need for some in-universe contrast or justification. The examples need to compare though because otherwise they just don't make sense.

I think at that point we were both getting confused, so apologies for the misunderstanding.

That's what I meant, the example, and thus the work, has to include both jerks and villains in order to explain why the jerks are seen as worse than the villains. The example I thought was suspect over this did have a villain, my mistake.

Thought, if we want to expand use of this trope (like the crowner called) maybe "Jerkassery Is Worse Than Villainy" is a better fit as it would allow characters who aren't usually jerks to count.

Sorry if I'm not getting it. I'll probably just leave you guys be as I'm not able to get this or help the process.

No, I think you're getting it. But the idea isn't necessarily that being a jerk is worse than being a villain but that audiences hate jerkass characters more than they hate villains. I think the wording of the title does throw it off a bit, but this is what was chosen in a crowner, so... I might not be making sense, but I think there's a distinction between "this thing is worse" and "this thing is disliked more by audiences".

Of note is that not every jerkass actually garners this reaction, which is why I think the UU overlap is so important here. Sometimes, characters who are intentionally jerkasses are made interesting enough to avoid being hated even if they're assholes. Make them comedic, sympathetic, rounded, or even just hot, and they'll more likely be forgiven by the audience. In this case, being a "jerk" moreso means that the character just isn't pleasant, and that the audience doesn't have things to like about them, intentionally or not.

We might also want to ping the actual launcher of this, ~Heavy Metal Hermit Crab, so if there's any confusion between us they can help clarify their thoughts.

Edited by WarJay77 on Jun 9th 2021 at 3:24:26 PM

I'll ask them if I feel the need to figure this out further. Thanks for your help.

Looks like the crowner got hit with Bibble Bobble. Can someone please revert it?

Edit: Thanks to whoever reverted the crowner! With that done, I think it can be called with a clear winner in "Allow all types of villains, if they're hated for being jerks more than for being villains"

Edited by idonom on Jul 9th 2021 at 3:06:06 AM

It's been at least a month. I think we can call the crowner now.

It's been well over a year.

Should I holler?

So I got a question based on a discussion about the trope in ATT.

It's not that one is necessarily worse than the other. Complete Monster is about people who are completely evil, while Jerks Are Worse Than Villains is about when people dislike a jerk more than they dislike a true villain.

Now this is a solid statement, but one thing piqued me. Is it possible to dislike a jerk more than the true villain when the true villain in question is a Complete Monster to the highest caliber?

This is just to supplement what to say on the trope description, though I will abide to what has been discussed in this topic.

Unrelated EDIT: This topic's title makes for a good laugh. So I guess we'd rather deal with Cleanup Threads than jerks.

Edited by ChrisX on Aug 30th 2021 at 10:46:56 PM

Sure. Why not? Not all Complete Monsters are disliked by the audience. Some can be fan favorites because Evil Is Cool. By contrast, the jerks are almost always bland and unpleasant.

Yeah, I can even give you an example from a show I watch: the 'Jerk' that the fandom hates is a bully. He has nothing to do with the main plot, he's just in a couple of episodes early in the show as a bog-standard bully who is a plot device to give one of the characters some development.

Meanwhile, of the plot villains that were active at the time, one is listed as a Complete Monster, but is an Evil Is Cool character that the fandom loves to hate. She went off the boil for a couple of seasons, but in the most recent one regained all her nasty, manipulative glory — and received a resounding "She's Back!!" response from the fandom. The bully, however? No-one likes bullies. There's nothing cool or fun about him. He's that bully ring-leader too many people have encountered in school, and that's how he was treated by the fandom.

Edited by Wyldchyld on Aug 9th 2021 at 10:55:22 AM